WELSH Labour MP Ann Clwyd has criticised the Archbishop of Canterbury for not doing enough to get Saddam Hussein indicted for mass murder before the invasion of Iraq.

Cynon Valley MP Ms Clwyd - Tony Blair's personal envoy to Iraq - revealed she had asked Dr Rowan Williams to take a leading role in her campaign in 2002 when he was the Archbishop of Wales.

Ms Clwyd campaigned against Saddam's human rights abuses for many years and, in 1996, founded a group called Indict which amassed evidence and sought to persuade governments to support moves to prosecute the dictator.

She said, "I went to see Rowan Williams in Newport in the summer of 2002 to try to get him to campaign for an indictment. He appeared to be quite enthusiastic at the time but all I ever saw was a quote from him in the Guardian some time later.

"I wish he, and others, had pursued the matter more vigorously. If Saddam had been indicted, he would have lost a lot of credibility in the Arab world and it may have been possible to avoid invasion."

On Friday, Dr Williams repeated his opposition to the invasion of Iraq and questioned whether he should have said more in the run-up to the war.

Asked about her reaction to Saddam's execution, Ms Clwyd said, "I am wholly opposed to the death penalty but, when I was in Baghdad just before Christmas, a number of Iraqis told me they did not want there to be any possibility that Saddam could be released at any time in the future.

"His trial was better than any others that have taken place in the Middle East and there was a mass of evidence against him for the atrocities committed by his regime, some of it collected by Indict. Around 200,000 Kurds were killed on his orders."

Reg Keys, from Llanuwchllyn, near Bala, a founder member of Military Families Against War, whose son Tom died serving as a Royal Military Policeman in Iraq, said, "It gives me no comfort whatsoever. The original objective was to find weapons of mass destruction and the Prime Minister said Saddam could stay in power as long as he handed over his weapons.

"Yes, I agree he was a vile dictator but his execution looked like a lynch mob. I found it very distasteful, it sends out the wrong message."